Louis Raemaekers will stand out for all time as one of the supreme
figures which the Great War has called into being. His genius has been
enlisted in the service of mankind, and his work, being entirely sincere
and untouched by racial or national prejudice, will endure; indeed, it
promises to gain strength as the years advance. When the intense
passions, which have been awakened by this world struggle, have faded
away, civilization will regard the war largely through these wonderful
drawings.
* * * * *
Before the war had been in progress many weeks the cartoons in the
Amsterdam _Telegraaf_ attracted attention in the capitals of Europe,
many leading newspapers reproducing them. The German authorities, quick
to realize their full significance, did all in their power to suppress
them. Through German intrigue Raemaekers has been charged in the Dutch
Courts with endangering the neutrality of Holland--and acquitted. A
price has been set on his head, should he ever venture over the border.
When he crossed to England, his wife received anonymous post-cards,
warning her that his ship would certainly be torpedoed in the North Sea.
The Cologne _Gazette_, in a leading article on Holland, threatens that
country that "after the War Germany will settle accounts with Holland,
and for each calumny, for each cartoon of Raemaekers, she will demand
payment with the interest that is due to her." Not since Saul and the
men of Israel were in the valley of Elah fighting with the Philistines
has so unexpected a champion arisen. With brush and pencil this Dutch
painter will do even as David did with the smooth stone out of the
brook: he will destroy the braggart Goliath, who, strong in his own
might, defies the forces of the living God.
When Mr. Raemaekers came to London in December, he was received by the
Prime Minister, and was entertained at a complimentary luncheon by the
Journalists of the British capital. Similar honour was conferred on him
on his second visit. He was the guest of honour at the Savage Club; the
Royal Society of Miniature Painters elected him an Honorary Member. But
it has been left to France to pay the most fitting recognition to his
genius and to his services in the cause of freedom and truth. The Cross
of the Legion of Honour has been presented to him, and on his visit to
Paris this month a special reception is to be held in his honour at La
Sorbonne, which is the highest purely intellectual reward Europe can
confer on any man.
* * * * *
The great Dutch cartoonist is now in his forty-seventh year. He was born
in Holland, his father, who is dead, having been the editor of a
provincial newspaper. His mother, who is still alive and exceedingly
proud of her son's fame, is a German by birth, but rejoices that she
married a Dutchman. Mr. Raemaekers, who is short, fair, and of a ruddy
countenance, looks at least ten years younger than his age. He took up
painting and drawing when quite young and learnt his art in Holland and
in Brussels. All his life he has lived in his own country, but with
frequent visits to Belgium and Germany, where, through his mother, he
has many relations. Thus he knows by experience the nature of the
peoples whom he depicts.
For many years he was a landscape painter and a portrait painter, and
made money and local reputation. Six or seven years ago he turned his
attention to political work, and became a cartoonist and caricaturist on
the staff of the Amsterdam _Telegraaf_, thus opening the way to a fame
which is not only world-wide but which will endure as long as the memory
of the Great War lasts. His ideas come to him naturally and without
effort. Suggestions do not assist him; they hinder him when he
endeavours to act on them. He is an artist to his finger-tips and throws
the whole force of his being into his work. Some years ago he married a
Dutch lady, who is devoted to music, and they have three children, two
girls and a boy (the youngest); the eldest is now twelve. Very happy in
his home, Mr. Raemaekers has no ambitions outside it, except to go on
with his work. A Teuton paper has declared that Raemaekers' cartoons are
worth at least two Army Corps to the Allies.
The strong religious tendency which so often distinguishes his work
makes one instinctively ask to what Church does the artist belong. He
replies that he belongs to none, but was brought up a Catholic, and his
wife a Protestant, and the differences which in later life severed each
from their early teaching caused them to meet on common ground. But the
intense Christian feeling of these drawings is beyond cavil or dispute:
they again and again bring home to the heart the vital truths of the
Faith with irresistible force, and the artist ever expresses the
Christianity, not perhaps of the theologian, but of the honest and
kindly man of the world.
Praise has been bestowed upon his work by several German
papers--qualified praise. The _Leipziger Volkszeitung_ has declared that
Raemaekers' cartoons show unimpeachable art and great power of
execution, but that they all lack one thing. They have no wit, no
spirit. Which is true--in a sense. They do lack wit--German wit; they do
lack spirit--German spirit. And what German wit and German spirit may be
one can comprehend by a study of Raemaekers' cartoons.
* * * * *
It has been well said that no man living amidst these surging seas of
blood and tears has come nearer to the role of Peacemaker than
Raemaekers. The Peace which he works for is not a matter of arrangement
between diplomatists and politicians: it is the peace which the
intelligence and the soul of the Western world shall insist on in the
years to be. God grant it be not long delayed, but it can only come when
the enemy is entirely overthrown and the victory is overwhelming and
complete.
Empire House, FRANCIS STOPFORD,
Kingsway, London. Editor, _Land and Water_.
February, 1916.
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AN APPRECIATION FROM THE PRIME MINISTER
Downing Street,
Whitehall, S. W.
Mr. Raemaekers' powerful work gives form and colour to the menace which
the Allies are averting from the liberty, the civilization, and the
humanity of the future. He shows us our enemies as they appear to the
unbiassed eyes of a neutral, and wherever his pictures are seen
determination will be strengthened to tolerate no end of the war save
the final overthrow of the Prussian military power.
Signed H. H. ASQUITH.
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